


Cicadas have no Memories

by Serymn



Category: Watamote
Genre: F/M, Gen, Other, Sibling Bonding, Sibling Love, Siblings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-03
Updated: 2013-12-29
Packaged: 2017-12-28 07:17:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 16,415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/989262
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Serymn/pseuds/Serymn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tomoki tries to survive a week alone at home with his sister. Some things bring back strange memories he never thought he could still remember. These sudden flashbacks of what he's been through with Tomoko were the least he expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. On Memory & Writing

**Author's Note:**

> Just Tomoki's inner monologue & thoughts on his sister. This occurs after the anime, when Tomoko told him that she would stop their nightly 'therapy talk'. Also has references to some events in the manga, and this happens when Tomoki is in the same high school with Tomoko. Tried for a nostalgic, slice-of-life feel. This is my first story for Watamote and the first I wrote with first-person POV.

_Monday_

My hell week started when I went down the stairs one Monday morning, and I saw Mom already dressed to go, with a luggage bag ready. She saw me walking down the stairs, and said, "Oh, Tomoki. Your aunt called this morning, your uncle just died. I have to go to back there to take care of your grandmother. Sad news, but I'll be back in a week at most. There's breakfast ready, but be sure to take care of the rest, you know how your sister is... I need to catch the early train. Goodbye, I left extra allowance on the table, and both your lunches. I'll call." She kissed my cheek and went out the door. I touched my face. Mom never does that.

Great. Just great. It's Monday, the week just starting, and I'm already looking forward to a damning week with no one at home but my sister. She's only trouble.

I started eating breakfast, toast and eggs and coffee as usual. Speaking of, she just went out the bathroom and sat down the table in front of me. "Where's Mom?" she asked. "Out of town. Relative died. She'll be back next week," I answered. She looked at me slyly, like she was thinking about how we're going to endure a week alone here. At least there's class and soccer practice, I won't be able to see her face the rest of the day. BUT I still have to cook breakfast or dinner for two, maybe lunch too. Well, she can't cook, but maybe I can make her buy groceries instead of me. (I'm already thinking of things to add to her lunch that can make her choke tomorrow.)

After brushing my teeth on the bathroom sink, I left. She was running up and down the stairs, looking for something in the same exaggerated and hysterical manner with shouting and making a mess along the way, ranting about science and deadlines. I called out, "Lock the gate when you leave!" and left. We go to the same school now, but leave home at different times. I hate being late, I'd like to be in class early, while she usually goes in her classroom just before the teacher arrives. I can see her sometimes from the window, rushing through to the school gate.

I can see her now, running towards the building. In my own room, the teacher just arrived for first period.

###

She always did and said creepy things, but the worst was when she innocently asked me to show my privates. What the actual hell? She even said something about taking a bath together like when we were younger. Naturally, I told her to fuck off. Imagine your own creep-ass sister molesting you. But she did look so sincere, even holding my hand like she was saying something so hopeful. She looked at me like she expected me to strip right then and there. As usual, I slammed the door to her face.

That's the sum of what we talk about. I never call her by name, only by 'Get out' or 'Get lost' when she used to go in my room and talk nonsense. Or 'Shut up' when she gets too noisy in the next room and I can't sleep or study with her incoherent wailing and talking to herself. I have never mentioned her name in my mind, even. The word  _nee-chan_  seems so weird now.

We used to talk for more or less an hour each night, last year. Mostly she talks and I listen. She sat on the floor, I stayed on my bed and hardly pretended I was interested. She said that she'll stop going to my room once she gets a boyfriend. She didn't have one when she decided to end those talks. I think, she doesn't need a boyfriend but a case worker or a therapist. I wonder what keeps my mom from doing just that.

Why can't she be normal? Hell, I know of many solitary classmates who are just content, who can interact normally with others. Sometimes I wish she could just be a normal quiet girl, not a delusional pervert always asking me about love and relationships and I just want to haul her out my room and leave me in peace. How the hell should I know about those things? I'm not much of a sociable guy myself, but she's just the worst.

She's stopped going in my room altogether, each night. I always told her to get out, anyway. The last was that when she asked me to 'take off your shorts' incident. She only talks to me when we're eating, now...

Which reminds me of lunch. My friends usually stay on the rooftop, where we play cards and talk to pass time. One of them brought a sleazy magazine with a girl on the cover barely covered by flimsy pieces of cloth, and the group read it together, laughing like loons. I look at those pictures and I don't find them interesting.

It only reminds me of my sister's half-assed attempts at seducing  _me._  It only makes her pathetic, and her jokes aren't funny. I've walked in on her room many times and see her animated porn games she doesn't even bother hiding from me. She's quite open about... getting off. She tells me her kinks, the dirty stuff from the games. She absent-mindedly mentions what she thinks of when she does it to herself. I don't like to imagine it, but she likes torturing me.

"You can get a girlfriend if you want to, but what's wrong with you? Some guys bend over backwards to impress the ladies, and you've got your own cheering squad when you play in the games, but you don't seem to care," said my friend, one who talks like he's 30 and not 15. The four of us ended up in the same high school.

"Because I don't."

He sighed. "So what's your sister's latest misadventure?"

"They get boring quickly. It makes you all laugh, sure, but it's more pathetic than funny," I said. I once talked to them about her attempt to look cute, and about her dousing herself in Coke Zero and thinking the guys want her when they only see ants crawling all over her. Gross. We had a good laugh over that. Though, my friends don't know she's in here. I think they just assumed she's in another school.

I think about girls, and all I can think of is how my sister fails at being one. She's the damn walking definition of a turn-off. Not that I have been 'turned on' by someone or anything. My friend claims I have fangirls, I said I don't see them. But he said it was because I looked like I was gonna eat people, like I was tired and in the verge of snapping something angry. "Unapproachable. Cool, silent type," he said.

"I'm just gay," I joked nonchalantly, and he just grinned and slapped my ass.

"The hell?!" I said. That was uncalled for.

"Nothing. You're cute."

Then, the bell rang. It was time for afternoon classes. While we went down the stairs, I saw her. She sat among overturned desks, her legs propped up on the table with her shoes on the floor, her skirt rolled against her thighs and showing too much skin. She didn't see me, she was busy smiling over something on her phone. But if I wasn't in a hurry or if I was alone, I would have gone to her and told her she should at least  _wear shorts_ if she wants to sit that way. No one seemed to notice her, and more people pass by the main stairs and not by this narrow fire-exit staircase. Classes went on as usual.

She's been okay, lately. No longer that nervous, not that anxiety-ridden anymore. Or she's still the same, I just think she's 'better' because she rarely talks to me like she used to, which was every night.

###

I went home around 5, I didn't stay around with the guys. I walked alone on the village street to home. She hasn't arrived yet. I mixed my afternoon coffee and turned on the TV, and after flipping through boring channels, I turned on the DVD player.

Oh. Mom didn't take the CD out, so it replayed from where she paused. Back to that old video of us as children, playing on the same carpeted spot where I am sitting now. It's disgusting to watch. Well, I could imagine these were different children, but I cringe inside when I've said I wanted to marry my sister when she's so different now. Those were more innocent times. The video continued, and I sipped my drink as I watched, careful not to choke. Two cute kids are on the screen.

"Brothers and sisters can't be married," said the girl.

"But, Onee-chan, we can stay together until we grow old!" the boy answered.

"We can just stay together and take care of mom and dad by ourselves, then."

"I won't get married, then! Neechan, you won't, too. Promise?"

"Tomo-kun, don't say that. We won't really be sure what will happen. You're saying that now, but who knows, in the future you can't stand me anymore." The young girl on screen seemed so wise, and what she said then turned out to be true now. Now she was replaced by a completely different person.

"Huh? That will never happen, neechan!"

I heard the gate open. I had to turn off the TV, I left the living room, and went upstairs to my room with my cup of coffee. Once I settled in my chair, I can hear her walking up the stairs. I can hear the door to her room slam close and then house is so quiet that I can even hear her sit and turn on her computer. I gathered all my books, it was time to study.

###

My mind lingered on other things while staring at algebraic equations, practicing solutions with a pencil on scratch paper. That video again, triggers a train of forgotten memories.

My first kiss was with her. We were children, all we did was play, and kiss. There was nothing wrong with that, then. We slept together, ate together, bathed together. But soon there was something wrong with the bathing together, and at that time the kissing also stopped. I used kissed her awake during mornings when she was still sleeping. I always woke up earlier than her, so I can see her pretty green eyes open. She'll wake up and kiss me back. Then, mother didn't have to tell us how awkward it all would be in the future. Then, years passed. I was growing up, developing. Not that she had developed much. She'll always look like a scrawny boy to me. It seems like I have never seen her as a girl, but another sex entirely.

Then, for inexplicable reasons, even if we lived in the same house she was a stranger. But before...

Once, it was Christmas and I was five and she was six. I learned about kissing under a mistletoe. I kept it like a secret, lured her down the wreath, and asked her to kiss me and she did. I remember when our lips touched my whole body seemed to tingle, a brief frisson. I smiled that whole day.

We promised that we would be together forever, with locked pinkies and all.

I was a selfish kid. I remember what I thought then, that if there was a silly rule in the world where I couldn't marry my nee-chan, the best I could do is magic to keep her. Every time there was a chance to wish: dropping coins to a wishing well, blowing a fallen eyelash to the air, and writing notes for the temple each New Year... I always wished about me and my sister.

Remember, that was when I was young. I look at her now and cringe. The fuck happened to her? Did the strange curse of the mistletoe somehow come true? I no longer believe in superstitions or make-believe rituals, but I'm scared I'll be stuck with her like this. Be careful what you wish for. I assure myself, though, that promises were always made to be broken.

Sometimes, she still wears the same cotton dress at home, new when she was ten. It's worn out now, the white stained yellow. I still like it better than when she just wears a shirt and shorts.

* * *

_Tuesday_

The stickers of her silly photo booth pictures she stuck on my walls, pictures, table, calendar, the damn light, I had rearranged in a neat grid on a fresh piece of paper. I keep it inside my drawer. Not that I'm sentimental, just OC, and throwing it away would be a waste of money, even if she was annoying. The pictures are hilarious, actually, only showing how much she isn't used to picture-taking. I know she did it out of spite because I wouldn't go with her. Hell, from what I can guess and what she implied when she talked to me, she even _puked_ after taking a good long look at the mirror.

(The cicada shell she left on my table is still there.)

That time I was sick and she stayed here so she'd get infected with my cold, she cried under my blanket for a long time. She was jealous, some of my girl classmates came round to visit but they only gave that day's homework that I missed. My hand hovered above her head, I was tempted to just pull her hair to get her off my bed. I wondered, was she jealous of me because someone thought to visit me and not her? Or was it she was jealous of those girls who talk to me...

(We had the same name except for one syllable.)

During nights, I content myself with looking out the window, watching the fleas dance under the streetlight. I can't sleep easily, and it's better than staring at my ceiling and wait for sleep to come.

She didn't go here for that one-hour talk. That was last year, but each night I still half-expect her to barge in and annoy me. For a long time, she did not. It's been months. Thank god.

* * *

_Wednesday_

Today, we agreed to buy lunch outside, and that I'll get take-out for dinner. I did wake up early, to cook rice and eggs for breakfast. I didn't see her at school or at home the most of morning.

In grammar class today, we were asked to write. The teacher gave us a topic: When was the last time you felt the closest to anyone? She gave us fifteen minutes to write. I'm not good at it and I couldn't think of anything. Everyone around me kept quiet as they scribbled but my paper stayed blank. The teacher passed by, looked at me and my pen. "Just write. Don't think," she said. Huh? How could I write if I don't think? Nothing comes to mind in the first place. Time passed, I still haven't got any words while the girl beside me is already halfway the back page of her own. I glanced at the clock, three minutes left.

I wrote fast. I just elaborated on how the only time I felt close to anything was when I'm playing sports. Everything else is gone except the game and the goal – and if I achieve it, it feels like nothing else. Or, I don't usually even have thoughts about success, but I feel like I don't exist in the game. It's a sort of freedom. Yeah, the thought sucks and is unclear but it's what I jotted down.

"Time's up. Pass your papers," the teacher said. She ruffled through the sheaf, scanned each paper, and commented, "I meant a person, not an object." Okay, that's me. So lame that I don't feel as close to anyone as I do with a soccer ball, eh? She said she'll check it and return tomorrow for revising.

###

When Tomoko arrived home at 6, she looks kinda shaken. Her hands tremble a bit on their grip on her backpack straps, she's looking at the floor, and she's gritting her teeth as she went up the stairs to her room. This expression is familiar – she might have suffered another embarrassing moment somewhere. I watched the news channel. The dinner's ready and I've eaten.

I hope she won't go in my room anymore, she's a pain in the ass and I'm not listening to her rambling. Well, she doesn't because she said talking to me didn't improve anything. I remember her dramatic last talk that I don't belong to "her future" anymore, that she had "no use" for me. Who does she think she is, saying that, assuming that I even cared?

(So much for childhood promises.)

8 PM. While I was drinking a can of Coke Light and reading manga after studying, she went in and sat on the floor in front of my bed. She didn't say a thing. I continued reading.

"Let's have sex."

I puked all my coke all over the book, including bits of undigested dinner.

"Got your attention, all right."

If she had wanted my attention, why say something as sick as that?

"Get. Out," I told her.

My head started to ache. Then everything went dark and blurry, and I couldn't control my head falling downwards with its weight, conscious but delirious and I stumbled to my bed and tried to sit. What she said felt like I was standing on a floor carpet and something suddenly tugged it away and left me to fall. After a few hazy minutes of me unaware of my surroundings, my mind felt clear again. She's still there, fanning me with a thin magazine and placing a tiny mint oil bottle open under my nose. She looked visibly relieved when she saw my eyes open.

"I honestly thought you were going to faint. I won't try to rape you or anything," she said.

"I was feeling kinda sick since this morning. You keep saying that kind of creepy shit and I'm really gonna vomit  _on you_. Bad idea for a joke,"

"I got to have the experience. It's wrong, but how can I perform well if... I just want... to be able to get off by something real... you're the only guy I know," she said with a stutter, I think she was just letting her mouth speak fast without thinking and it's irritating to see and hear.

"Can you hear what you're saying?! Couldn't you just shut up about it and forget it?" I answered.

"Otouto... I'm sick. I'm so sick. Forget it. I know we can't. Just hug me. It will make me feel better," she said, kneeling in front of me, her hand fisting her skirt. She pressed her wet face in front of my shirt. Tears, snot, and sweat. I stayed still, she stayed still as well, both of us. This near, she was so small. Her forehead barely reaches my chest. Her hands slowly went up to encircle my waist.

Begrudging, I acquiesced. This is how she held me. Before, when I was smaller, my wet face would press against her like how  _she_ was against me right now when it was me who was crying. I used to be smaller than her. I let my right hand around her and touch her left shoulder. My hands held the back of her waist. She seemed so small, frail,  _breakable_. She sobbed for no reason. Her hands ran up against my thighs. We stayed that way for a minute. Then she let go, left, and went back to her room.

When we were younger, she'd usually kiss me when I was crying. I didn't do that. What the hell her problem was this time, she didn't tell me.

Then I realized what she said, and what we just did was... ew, but then I felt too sick and weak to kick her out.

(Sometime when I was sleeping I heard her come in. Ah, to clean the vomit...)

* * *

_Thursday_

In class today, the teacher returned our papers. My half-assed essay was returned with the note "Change subject". Our lesson was about revision. I half-listened at the lecture about deleting unneeded phrases, or adding more detail, checking punctuation. Then she gave us time to write again. I won't rewrite, but I have to start on new one entirely.

"The writing process sometimes brings back memories you only thought you have forgotten. By starting on a page, one usually finds what one wants to say in the act of writing itself. I have told some to not think – I know that sounds ridiculous. What I mean is sometimes you don't have to be in such tight control of what you want to say because that freezes you. Sometimes the best writing is spontaneous – your first, real thoughts, not the thoughts you'd like yourself to think."

I thought, when was I close to anyone? My friends? They're fun, but they're all equal to me, I don't favor one over the rest. My family? There are cousins I'm okay with. Dad's out of the question – he's always away on business trips, he goes home around once a week if he's busy. Mom? My sister? Okay, that's the easiest to write about, so I started a half-hearted essay, I was tempted to lie and make up a story. To my surprise, the teacher was right. How memory works is surely weird, but I kept my hand moving across the page. It was strange how this just popped up, a story about us as children from a summer years ago, the season for cicadas.

The teacher said time's up. I quickly thought of a title, wrote "Cicadas have no Memories" at the top of the page then passed it in front.

"I'll check it, and the best essays I choose will be read tomorrow by those who wrote them," she said, and dismissed the class.

###

It rained again, beating and pouring down my umbrella as I ran home. Soccer practice at 4 PM was cancelled due to an unexpected storm. Strong wind blew rain in all directions, beating water against my uniform, the sound was like TV static turned up to maximum volume. Something snapped, the umbrella's frame reversed and turned upwards. The black plastic cover went down with the rain, floating at the flooded side of the sidewalk away from me. Rain bathed me.

I dropped the useless umbrella, hugged my sling bag and ran. Home was four blocks away. I paused to open the gate, and rushed to the bathroom. I undressed, and my soaked clothes were so heavy with water. I ran hot water to the tub and plunged right to the steaming water. Outside, the rain has stopped. Somehow, I have bad luck with rain – my umbrella always breaks, I'm always outside when it's the heaviest. I sat in the warm water, hugging my knees.

The bathroom's door opened and it was her, still wearing her uniform and hooded jacket. I recoiled, she merely raised an eyebrow and walked to the toilet. She went in to pee. I watched her and saw how her feet dangle as she sat, they don't reach the floor. She was too small, too short.

"What's wrong, Tomo-kun?" she asked.

"Tsk.  _Don't call me that_ , and you could've knocked," I said.

"Then you should have locked the door." She stood up, adjusted her underwear, let the skirt fall.

"What are you thinking of? Why're you watching me like that?"

"I don't think anything," I said and turned away. Then she locked the door for me before she went out. I got up later after dozing, dressed, went to the kitchen to cook rice for dinner. When I went outside the hang my wet clothes to dry, she was playing with a white spotted cat. We don't have pets, I'm allergic. "He went with me to watch the meteor shower once," she said, stroking the cat.

###

I ate by myself again. After that, I knocked at her door. "It's your turn to wash the dishes," I said through the closed door. I didn't see her for the rest of the night again, but I did hear the clatter of cutlery downstairs, and her going upstairs. I slept earlier than usual.

* * *

_Friday_

In that class, a boy was called out to read his seatwork from yesterday.

"My mother was insane. She was in a mental hospital and I used to visit her everyday to bring food and read aloud some novels for her. She always told me that she wanted to commit suicide. I told her I want her with me, but if that's what she wants, I'm okay with it. I never told the doctors, even after the news came that she hung herself with a rope twisted out of her blanket," he read. It was long, written in simple words, but everyone fell silent. The teacher simply called out the next, a girl whose story was about her twin who died when they were younger.

"Next is Tomoki's. It's about his sister," the teacher said. I didn't expect my name, the previous readers talked about death and mine wasn't. Even before I walked to the front to face everyone, I could hear my friends snickering at the back. Frankly, I forgot what I wrote, I just recall it was about my sister and cicadas. I knew it could sound embarrassing. I took the paper from the table and started reading.

 _Cicadas have no Memories_ , by Tomoki Kuroki

_When I was nine, me and my sister used to collect insects, both dead and alive. Once, we were lost while searching cicada shells upon trees. During sunset drifting to evening, we were engrossed while collecting that we didn't notice we were far from where we came from. Only thick trees surrounded us, and I couldn't even see the dim streetlights. I was scared, and there was no one except her and our net full of dead insect skins and the loud singing of crickets, a sound that I found oppressing. I told her I was frightened, then she kissed me. We sat huddled in the dark, on the roots of a large tree. She whispered a story to comfort me._

_"Once, there was a brother and sister lost in the woods, because their evil step-mom didn't want them so she sent them to die with hunger in the forest. But they had bread, and soon found another way out with their father by trailing the broken crumbs on the floor..." she said, and both of us stuck in an embrace since it was cold._

_I told her we didn't have bread. We were real and we would not be saved by fairy tales. She told me that maybe mom and dad were already looking for us, she told me to calm down and continued her story. The two children found a house deep in that forest, a house made of candy with chocolate floors, sugar-glass windows, and curtains made of frosting. They ate the candy._

_I said that maybe we could look for that house. When I was a kid, I never doubted its reality, it was easy to fool me. I believed in tooth fairies, Santa Claus, and promises. She said we won't try to find the candy house, because the witch ate kids and how could we go back home if we became her dinner? But she forgot the rest of the story, and she said to try walking out again, but I was scared and she still tried to make me get up, assured me she can find a way out._

_"It's okay. I'm here. If we keep on walking, we'll find a way out." Like the kids in the story, we left a single cicada shell on the grass. It was a waste to let go of it all, but we followed the story's example. We walked, and the moonlight was just enough for us to see by. After walking, we found the same spot where we had huddled earlier; we had walked in a circle._

_Now, we were really lost then. I started to cry, then. She kissed me again, like she always did when I was crying. I could feel that she was scared, too. There might be other things lurking in there, between the trees. But she held me. We were so stuck together, gripping on one another, that it seemed our breaths and heartbeats were one. It felt as if we would ever let go, one of us would vanish forever in the darkness beyond, far within the trees. I closed my eyes and I couldn't even speak, my fear has taken my voice._

_We walked again, collecting the shells we left on the way, and veered off to another direction. We stopped on each step, her observing if this was the same place we had been. I calmed down, after walking, we reached the parking lot, and my mother found us – she hugged us both so tight it hurt. We were lost since five p.m. and it was nearly nine, and at that time it was all less than an hour to me._

_That was the only time I ever felt close to someone. After that moment, when we were one, that closeness never repeated again. It was when we began to drift apart, living in the same house but always strangers. I can compare it to things in space – things combust, the space expands to infinity, what was once one will be broken and will never meet again. I had my sports, she had her anime and comics and games. Never once during middle school did we talk properly. We do, lately, but its annoying. Its not like before._

_Frankly, I think of her as a bother now. I would like to write more about the funny, embarrassing, and pathetic things she does just to show off... but I'm running out of time, the clock says it's near deadline and that would be off-topic. Really, it will take another, longer essay._

Done. When I lowered the paper, my friends were all laughing silently and I sneered at them.

"Well. I hope things go better with you and your sister," the teacher said, and called out the next student to read. My fairy story was nothing compared to their... heavier experiences about love and loss, poverty and death. Mine was too simple and forgettable.

###

That afternoon, there was a belated announcement on another special holiday break that left us to half-day with no class. I know she's eating lunch in some corner between buildings, always alone. I knew right away she was lying when she said she had a boyfriend who eats with her – it's okay if she embarrasses herself in front of me (cause I'm used to it), but I don't like to imagine if with  _other people_. It makes me ashamed for her.

I went there and she's there as expected and I told her there was no class and we can go home. She perked up right away, and said, "Really? Then I'll get my bag." I waited. Home was within walking distance, but she said she was going to buy something for school, and we ended up in a bookstore. We stayed for hours, with her reading one manga after another. I passed the time reading as well. After that, she pointed to the WcDonald's and said she was hungry. (I still recall the last time we met here on accident and her sickening disguise, but it was a long time ago.)

We both ordered a burger and large fries, not speaking that whole time. I noticed some students from our school, too, looking at us curiously. Then we walked home.

We passed by a large tree, and I noticed an open cicada shell on the trunk. I picked it up and showed it to her. I placed it inside the empty container of french fries from WcDonald's she was holding. Then, she disappeared down the trees. I waited, and she returned, the box was now half-way filled with the dry insect husks. She was always better at looking for them than me.

We went home. The phone rang and she answered, it was Mom. She nodded along and said yes, then closed it again.

"Mom said they'll hold the funeral earlier on Sunday because some of her cousins need to leave early to another country. We'll have to go there tomorrow morning, ride the bus."

I nodded.

We didn't sleep. She doesn't sleep, and in the silence of 3 AM I can hear the clicks of her mouse in the next room, she's still online. Me, I thought of nothing in particular while doing a meditation of staring at the streetlight outside, in the darkness of my room.

* * *

_Saturday_

Come morning, we took turns in the bathroom and ate sandwiches for breakfast, and set out. I wore my baseball cap, dressed in simple clothing: shirt, camo jeans, sneakers. She had her Fidel Castro hat, the bug-shades, a blouse, capris, sandals. Sometimes you're so used to something that you don't notice it anymore, and once you do it's like you're a stranger in your own city, amazed all over again – like how I often forget that the sun rises in this country first than anywhere else in the world. As we went out to the first bright at 5:30 AM, I thought that I've always liked sunrises more than sunsets.

We were the first on the still empty bus when we reached the station, and once seated she slept immediately, leaning back on her seat. The bus filled quickly, and I pulled down my cap over my face and slept, too. Sometime during the journey there were bumps in the road that made the passengers tumble all over, and I woke to find her head resting on my lap. I was annoyed by the drool on my jeans, but I was too sleepy myself to mind.

_End_


	2. Found Compositions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't intent this to be a multi-chapter story, but there may be another last chapter (not actually sure, since I have no ideas as of now). The last one left a lot of possibilities and I liked writing Tomoki's thoughts, it's light compared to what I usually write. This will still follow a 'Weekly' format. Thanks to the few who liked this simple story...

_Sunday, 12 AM onwards_

The memorial service for an unmemorable dead relative went okay. There were fewer people than I expected, and it was the usual greetings with relatives who ask us about our lives. Tomoko skipped the socializing after the ceremony by staying in the room where we stayed, pretending to be sick from travel. We used to go to this place for summer vacations, but during middle school up to now we didn't come here as often. We were going home before Monday.

Night came. Three of us, me, Mom, and her, slept in the same sparse guest room, in the same bed. She was in the middle. We both shared the same wide white cotton pillow. Mom slept easily, already lightly snoring on the far end of the bed, while I closed my eyes but couldn't will myself to sleep. Tomoko hoarded all the blankets, wrapped it all around herself.

I saw the clock tick to signal another day, past 12 but sleep seemed far away. Sleeping in another place I wasn't used to didn't help the insomnia. I wondered if Tomoko was really sleeping or just pretending to, like me. I can feel her breath on my neck. For the first time in years, we shared the same bed.

"I can't sleep," she whispered, as if sensing that I'm awake.

"Hey, let's go out for a walk," she said again, tugging on my arm and sitting up from her layers of blankets.

"Hn. Just try to sleep. Where would you go at a time like this, anyway?" I talked in a low voice so as not to wake our mother.

"I can't sleep here like this. If you won't come, then I'll go out alone," she said, crept off the bed and went out the door. I let some time pass, guessing that my mother won't notice at all if we sneak out. Then I went out the room myself to the kitchen where was rummaging the fridge for soda, candy, and ice cream.

"Let's go," she said, handing me a Coke Zero can and a frozen chocolate popsicle.

"What are you up to?" I asked, almost hesitating, but I couldn't leave her alone to explore the dark outside. This is a rural place and the nearest neighbor was far away. The house where we stayed was beside the orchards, wide rice and corn fields stretching for miles. I remember how we used to play here during summers years ago, chasing dragonflies floating through the sepia-colored sunset, their lacy wings always out of our reach. It was a fine night, not that cold, the moon a smiling crescent.

She walked on the soil ridges between the wide plots of rice grass, and we walked for a long time until the house where we came from was out of view. Then she sat, watching the moon. I sat as well. It's like we were in the middle of a sea, the leaves looked more dark blue than green. I drank the Coke first.

"It's so boring. I haven't even been online since yesterday morning," she said, munching on her ice cream. This moment reminded me of how once she invited me to burn fireworks with her, but I didn't want to and I only watched her that June night, the multi-colored stream of sparks illuminating her wan smile. I had watched from my window on the second floor as she had burned them all one by one downstairs, outside.

During this odd hour of morning, it seemed that everything was a dream. Weird things always happen by midnight, as said by those children's stories. Cinderella's deadline was 12, or monsters and ghouls appear. As I sat on the grass, I thought that nights in the city are way too loud. Here, the familiar buzz and pitch of singing cicadas are all we can hear. I recall Tokyo at night with all the noise, smog, and blaring lights that goes brighter as night deepens to morning. In this silence, it seemed to me that we're in a foreign country. We haven't gone here for a long time, after all.

The stars have always been brighter here, but tonight the sky was dense with dark clouds and no stars were in view. This place is so unlike where we came from.

She was now eating chocolate Pocky, holding the coated biscuit sticks between her fingers and biting them one by one.

Somehow, all this seems absurd. I felt like I had sleep-walked, like I was detached and just watching this silent situation unfold. That's insomnia, they say, feeling like you're there but you aren't there, one is always drifting through daily life half-awake.

"How about we go there?" she pointed to the patch of forest far off. "There used to be fireflies there," she said, and stood to walk. She left me, not caring if I follow or not, maybe expecting that I wouldn't because I always refused anyway. But then, being left in the middle of nowhere at this time of night was a bit creepy, even if my sister was planning to go alone to what seemed like a creepier place. At least, it's better to share the scare with someone.

So when I arrived, I saw her look at me before stepping backwards into the woods. A dark curtain seemed to fall in her taking that one step, as she seemed to disappear, as if the forest swallowed her. This vaguely reminded me of what I wrote in class last week, 'Cicadas have no Memories'… like Hansel and Gretel lost in the forest.

I stepped in that shadow entrance too, walked in deeper through the trees, only hearing the crunch of my steps as my slippers crushed dried leaves. The trees were only black shadows, and there was no sign of Tomoko.

Then I saw her, sitting under a tree and fireflies floating around her. There were a few shimmers here and there at first, but suddenly they all flashed in unison and there were actually so many of them around, floating around like glowing gold dust. Amazed, I sat beside her as well, watching the small insects. It's been so long since I saw this. We sat there, shoulder to shoulder, just watching the tiny shimmers that were so few moments before, now surrounding us with dots of light that hovered on the ground to the leaves above.

We didn't talk, and sometime there I fell asleep, from the lulling rythm of blinking lights and the voices of insects. I wasn't aware of it until cold drops of melted ice cream fell into my hair (it was mine, she took it). I was already sprawled on the ground with my head on her thigh.

They looked brighter now, but she said we must go back before our mother wakes up. All of it seemed unreal.

We didn't get lost.

We walked again, the moon already low and sunrise a few hours away. Mother was still sleeping, and as soon as our heads settled on the pillow we were fast asleep, the memory of glowing fireflies under our closed eyelids.

###

Our mother gently shaked us awake, the noon sun already high and the sunlight from the window casting a pool of sunlight to the bed where we slept. The first thing I see is her eyes, and we were sleeping in the middle of the bed, in the same pillow and facing each other, the tips of our noses barely an inch apart. I was still sleepy, so I didn't feel like moving.

"Fix your things, we'll go back home after lunch," Mom said. I didn't register the day, and we lay there, in the dreamlike trance between sleeping and waking, seeming unaware that we were looking at each other's drowsy, glazed eyes.

We went home exhausted after a three-hour long train ride, and we arrived home by evening. All three of us retired to our rooms after dinner to rest. I'm wondering about my father, it has been almost two weeks since I last saw him. Sometimes I even forget he exists at all.

* * *

_Monday_

I have a huge suspicion that Tomoko is gay. Her only friend I know was a girl who was her classmate in middle school. From phone conversations I can hear from my room, they're arranging dates and places to meet up. She's the only person I've noticed Tomoko is interacting to, someone she calls "Yuu-chan". She's been at home a few times before but I only saw her in glimpses.

Before I went home this afternoon I passed by her, Yuu, on the school gate. I didn't realize it was her at first. She seemed startled when she saw me. She walked nearer to me as I approached the gate. The few visits she had at home when I was there, she looked different, with long braided black hair and thick glasses that obscured her eyes. This girl, with dyed light strawberry blonde hair and large brown eyes, was different. I only recognized her familiar voice.

"Oh. You're Tomoki-kun, right? Have you seen Mokochi?" she asked, and I stopped walking. At first I briefly wondered who she was looking for, but realized that  _Mokoch_ _i_  was her nickname for Tomoko.

"I haven't seen her all day at all. Maybe she's at home now, because I passed by her classroom and no one's there. Why?"

Another guy was with her, far from the street but approaching us. He was scowling, as if waiting for her to hurry up. "Thank you, Tomoki-kun! Please tell her that I looked for her and she can text me if there's any problem." Then she ran to him, and they walked away.

"Okay," I said even if I'm sure she wouldn't hear, and I walked home. When I arrived, Tomoko still wasn't there. I greeted my mother, and went up my own room to study. I heard her arrive in her room, as usual she was talking to herself in hysterical nonsense. We didn't even eat together with mom during dinner.

Come 9 PM, she opened the door to my room again, and sat on the floor, like before when we... I mean when  _she_ used to talk to me. I was lying in bed reading.

"I thought you'd stop talking to me like this," I said, I didn't even look up from the textbook I was pretending to read (nothing gets in my head anyway).

"Do any of your friends have girlfriends?"

"None that I know of. Some want to, but they don't."

"Do you want to have a girlfriend, or do you already have a girlfriend? Or do you like guys?"

I didn't answer. I continued reading. "I saw Yuu-chan in school this afternoon. She was looking for you," I said instead.

She looked down, picked up loose bits of thread from the blue carpet.

"She was about to introduce me to her boyfriend but I ran away before he arrived. So what do you think of Yuu-chan? Did you find her cute?"

"She's different now. Unlike you."

"Yeah. And I thought before that she was the worse loser. Turned out I'm mistaken."

I didn't listen anymore, as I concentrated on my reading, her talking was only background noise. I know she knows I don't pay attention to her anymore, but she didn't mind and kept on talking. I still heard most of what she said, about how Yuu-chan was kind to her, how they spent the day together in a school fair before, and now Yuu-chan had a boyfriend to spend time with instead of her and she feels kind of rejected. After saying everything there was to say, she said goodnight and left for her room.

* * *

_Tuesday_

I happened to sprain my left wrist during basketball for PE, having stretched my arms to much. I'm better at kicking things than that sport. I ended up on the infirmary. I sat on the bed, resting my hand after the nurse applied ice and wrapped it up and told me not to stress it too much. There is only a flimsy curtain held up by a rod separating this bed from the next bed, where I can see someone's shadow. The nurse left, replaced by another girl who stayed in the infirmary for her. She smiled at me, a girl in casual clothes of shirt and jeans, she had short black hair clipped neat. She read through the nurse's clipboard, where student records are probably written.

"Tomoki Kuroki?" she asked me. I nodded.

"Do you happen to be related to Tomoko Kuroki? She's also there, on the next bed, she passed out during PE again."

"Ah. I'm her brother."

"A transferee? Are you her older brother?"

"No, I'm the younger one."

"Oh." She glanced at the clipboard again, maybe seeing the "1" after the name of my section indicating that I'm in the first year.

"These records say that she's anemic. She's passed out several times before according to the nurse and her teacher..." she said with a frown, as if she's worried for Tomoko. I leaned and opened the curtain separating us, and there she was, sleeping.

"When she wakes up, she'll be sent home. You can go with her." She smiled.

"It's just a small sprain. I'll go, if you say so," I said.

"How's your sister?"

"Well..." I didn't know what to say. Fourtunately, I was interrupted by Tomoko waking up, I can hear the noisy shuffling of sheets as she sat up from the bed. She lifted the curtain and saw me and the student.

"Are you quite well now, Kuroki-san? The nurse advised that you can go home to rest."

"Ah." Tomoko answered, then looked at me and my bandaged hand.

She got up and was about to go out the door, and the girl handed her a piece of paper. She gave me one too, it was an excuse slip signed by the nurse for the teachers. Tomoko was already out the door.

"Nice to meet you, Tomoki. I'm Megumi Imae," she said, and smiled again to me before I went out. On the hallway, I caught up a step behind Tomoko and she spoke, "Ah. Then I can go home and play games for the rest of the day."

"I'm excused too," I said, then she turned to look at me. It was already lunch break, and I can go in and get my bag without a fuss. She was waiting for me on the school gate, and we walked home together again, both of us still in our PE uniforms and not speaking along the way.

Our mother greeted us at the door. "Why are you both home so early today?" she asked.

"I passed out again," Tomoko said.

"I sprained my wrist," I said.

"Tomoko, we really have to do something about that fainting of yours. You've passed out many times."

"The nurse said I'm anemic. There are medications she said I need to take, it's written here." She gave a slip of paper to Mom, and hurried back upstairs to her room.

"How about you? How did that happen?"

"PE, too. Basketball. It's fine, I can go to school tomorrow." I went up to my room, too.

After lunch, I didn't see her the whole afternoon. I only read stuff, I wanted to play video games but my hand hurts.

After dinner, she followed me to my room, and sat on the floor in her usual position.

"What again?" I asked.

"What can you say about the girl in the infirmary?"

"What about her?"

"She's a senior student, now graduated, maybe just visiting the school. She's popular. Smart, kind, friendly, cute."

"And so?" This made me recall how much I wanted to go to another school far from home so I wouldn't see her all the time. I already planned it in my mind, finding a decent dorm and maybe going home twice a month or so. But then, that I'm in the same school as hers was her fault for forgetting to mail my application. I've not thought of that, staying here was better after all.

"I want to be like her. How do I become like her?"

"I don't know. Maybe you should study a lot, try to know more people and be more kind to them, comb your hair more? Huh, as if there are people you can be kind to if you know none of them..."

"Are you making fun of me?" she asked, taking what I said as an insult.

"Or you can stop attempting to be like someone else." And it was her trying to be other than what she was the cause of her problems. Of course, if you're not happy with yourself you should try to change if it will make you feel better. But you should also think of what is better... to change, or simply accept myself as I am? I'm no expert on these matters, and I didn't tell her all this. I dislike giving advice to people who aren't asking for it, that seems too assuming if they don't need it. No one truly knows or can judge, except that person himself.

"I know. But that's easier said than done."

Then back to that old routine. I read, she was speaking, about how one afternoon she was sitting alone and this large, pink dog mascot gave her a balloon and a surprise hug. She talked about how she first met Imae when she had a bleeding cut on her hand and she happened to bump into her. She speaks like she admires her. She was there during the graduation ceremony and watched her. Last, she told me about her funny and depressing attempt at befriending her... that the wind lifted the other girl's skirt up, her underwear showed, and she looked back at Tomoko. She felt like Imae might think she was a huge pervert. 

She ended up crying and running for no reason, all her despair and anguish about the concept of popularity and everything else. After that, she decided and realized it doesn't actually matter if she was a  _mojo_  but until now it  _does_  matter, that it was difficult to get rid of the old ways of thought no matter how much she tries to convince herself.

I fell asleep from all her blather, actually. I opened my eyes again sometime that night, the light is off, my book placed on the table. She had pulled the blanket over me.

* * *

_Wednesday_

I went home earlier again. I passed by the closed door of my sister's room before mine, then a sudden urge made me take a step back and go to her room. Why not? She often goes in my room leaving or taking things without my permission, and but she gets annoyed when I go to her room. Of course, I only go there rarely, to borrow games or old textbooks.

There was clutter of unwashed clothes, scattered CD cases, and manga on her floor. The sunset cast an orange light all over the room, making everything look out of time. On her computer table, beside the keyboard, there was an old notebook with my name on it scrawled in my own rakish handwriting of a kid still learning to write.

_Mine? How did it get in here?_

And yes, it was mine. Flipping over it, were drawings in crayon and faded stickers of cartoon characters. Opening the first page again, was a composition I wrote long ago.

 _My Big Sister_  by Tomoki Kuroki

_I love my big sister. She is very nice and always plays with me. She helps me when I am in trouble. She helps Mom with the housework in my stead. That is why I love my big sister!_

It made me cringe a bit. But why was she keeping it?

I heard her voice greeting our mom, then I placed the notebook back the way I found it. Quiet, I slid the door close then went to my own room. After almost a year, she went to my room last two nights. The usual, she talks, I pretend to listen. Tonight though, she didn't.

* * *

_Thursday_

Somehow, we have gotten into the habit of waiting for each other before we walk home together. Now, there are more days we go home this way than each of us alone. It's always by the wall outside beside the school gate. I cross my arms, lean on the wall. She'll pass by then I'll follow her, or sometimes I find her in the same spot where I stand when I walk out after the last class is dismissed. We don't always talk. There's a distance between us where I walk first or she's ahead, so that people won't think we're together at all but only two strangers who happen to walk in the same direction.

My friends don't notice. They still don't know her.

We stopped by the bookstore again, and she was reading the back of a familiar book... a translation of  _Flowers in the Attic_  by V.C. Andrews. I heard about it from some of the girls in my class who happened to read it. You know them, hiding their small romance pocketbooks inside larger textbooks so teachers won't see them reading when there's class.

She was about to open it, but then noticed me looking at it.

"You know about this? You seem to have read it the way you squint at it," she asked.

"You better not read it."

"Why, what's it about?" The way she said it implied that my silly semi-warning only made her more interested.

"Rape, abuse, overdramatic family problems. A brother and his sister... get it on near the end."

 _Hell_. Now she looked at me with that 'sly pervert' smirk.

"You  _like_  reading that kind of shit? You were turned on?"

"I just heard about it, its pretty popular that the plot's common knowledge now."

"It looks too long to read. You're all literary now, huh. What the rape's about, just summarize it for me."

"Trapped inside by an evil parent and a grandmother, you know, growing up and puberty all that, they had no one to turn to after years. It's crap, I only know about it because my friend read it."  _What the hell am I saying_. Then, she went to the manga section instead. There's really nothing to do while waiting for her. I just took book after book, looking at the covers and reading the text at the back that tell what it's about. Most of the Andrews books deal with incest they say. Not that I'm interested, not that I read much even, but I prefer fantasy/adventure or manga. I like pages of drawings in manga than blocks of text in books.

After she went to me, carrying her purchase, we went to buy take-out at WcDonalds then headed home. There were many cicada shells on the tree trunks we passed, shining amber from the deep yellow-orange light of the sunset shining on the street and trees. Seeing them is like... scratching an itch. You can't help but take them. So we walked, she's ahead, me picking them up one by one until I'm home with a handful of shells on my left hand.

In a fit of boredom, I arranged them all by size from smallest to large in a spiral pattern on my table. She didn't go in again.

* * *

_Friday_

I left school by evening, the soccer practice ended late and there was another school competition next week. I ate dinner, went to my room, and found her sitting on my chair and making a mess of the things on the table. She was reading some stray pieces of paper with my writing on them.

"Tsk. Get out if you're just gonna mess up my things and won't even fix them back," I greeted her, taking off my white sling bag and placing it on the bed. What the... she was reading that thing I wrote in class about her. Cicadas have no Memories. She stayed quiet and pretended I didn't exist. She's so slow in reading it while I sat in my bed, and in irritation I tried to take it from her grasp and she grabbed it back, causing the paper to tear.

She only took it from my hand, took the two pieces together and read. Then she looked at me funny.

"Its from a spontaneous class exercise in automatic writing. I just wrote what useless things were in my head for the sake of having something to pass," I said.

"Denying it, Tomoki-kun? Want a kiss? Scared?" she said, mocking me.

"The door's open. You have my permission to leave."

She was sitting on my chair, I was sitting on the bed, and she rolled the chair towards me. Then she only smiled, and leaned nearer to me as if she was going to kiss me. I only grasped her head again, my palm over her eyes and fingers digging in a way I know will hurt, what I usually do when I find her too annoying. She slapped the hand away and leaned closer, then when I flinched she smirked.

And only because she was irritating, getting too near for comfort then withdrawing away, it was her intention for me to flinch and she smirked at the reactions of disgust on my face. And only because I was annoyed - not for any other reason at all, and I wanted to see how she reacts this time because I wanted to get even since she seemed like a sadist. Smirking at me with that mocking look. So the next time she was pressing her face near my face, her damnable mouth, I leaned over, touched her nape and did something I didn't do for years -  _kiss_  her. But it really was more like I was only defiantly pressing my lips to her mouth - slightly open from shock, when I was about to let go and drag her out the door...

"Tomoki? Tomoko?" It was our father's voice. I realized with horror that the door was open. She's sitting on the swivel chair, me on the bed and somehow holding her head and our lips together in the most awkward manner.

How would I explain this? I saw her eyes widen in shock, too, then she gently pushed my shoulders away to face our dad.

But when we looked him, he only smiled like there was nothing wrong. Like it was normal. And it  _was_  normal, before.

"I brought a lot of food and things for you, so come downstairs." He left.

She wiped her lips with the back of her hand while glaring at me.

"You really like me, right?"

"Don't flatter yourself," I said, and I went out of my room to go downstairs, and she followed me out.

_End_

 


	3. Pieces of Summer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (another week alone, where they agree on another kind of relationship).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For this last chapter, there's pseudo-incest, and I'm afraid it'll either make the story worse or won't affect it at all. I rewatched the show and noticed that the box in the basement with cicada shells was labeled "Pieces of Summer, Tomoki and Tomoko". So that's where the chapter title came from. Enjoy (... I hope).

_Friday, continued_

She went to my room again. I'm sitting on my chair and facing my table and she's sitting on the floor. I was looking out the window. I couldn't see her, and that's better, I think.

"Why did you do that?" she asked.

"Do what?" I asked back.

"That kiss."

"Was it even a kiss? I was annoyed, that's why."

"That's a really lame reason. Who kisses people when they're annoyed?"

"So what did you wanna hear? That I like you, that's why I did it?"

"Why, what else?"

"Hn. Think what you want. You can get out now."

She stayed.

"Do it again."

"What? No. Why?"

"I liked it. Again."

A long minute of silence passed.

"Then get near here," I said, and turned the chair around to face her. She was standing right in front of me. She's short, and when I'm sitting straight we have about the same height when she's standing. She stepped closer, until her thighs touched my knees. I don't know how I should do this. She leaned her face closer, and I touched her cheek, tentative. She turned pink. Ragged, slow breaths from her mouth ghosted over my face.

"I can't, because your breath stinks." Then I pushed her face away, tried to put force in my hand to make it hurt for her. She looked funny. Anyway, her breath did stink. She smelled of vomit. I mean, I can always hear her puke from her room. She even has a supply of paper bags in her room with her always vomiting.

"Bastard!" she said, touching her cheek. Then she tried to smell her own breath. Her expression told me she didn't find her own breath that agreeable as well. I grinned.

"Fine. I'll stop," she said and went out. I went out too, there was still ice cream left downstairs to eat. Dad bought too much chocolate that I could live on Hershey's and Toblerones for weeks.

###

I stepped in the bathroom to brush my teeth, and she was already there too, gargling down mouthwash. Our eyes happened to meet in the wide mirror. Her face was still red from my hand that pushed her. After I finished, she was still standing.

"That's it. It's all menthol now." Then she blew her breath to me and it was cold from all that mouthwash. I wiped my mouth with a towel, and leaned my face to hers. She tilted her head up, eyes expectant. I placed my palm on the top of her head. She looked up, wondering why.

"Still no. I'm a foot taller than you and I don't like to bend over, sorry. Next time, maybe." Then I left her alone. She wasn't angry about it, but smiled instead before I left.

That night, I couldn't sleep that well again. I touched my lips, and recalled that the last time I kissed her (before this night) was during that incident I've written about in 'Cicadas have no Memories' years ago. I had the feeling that there was more to that story than what I could remember.

* * *

_Saturday_

Dad wanted to spend time with us, so for this Saturday we went out. We wandered in malls, ate lunch in a restaurant. She's wearing this pink floral dress dad brought yesterday, while I got new shirts. I'm wearing one of them now, plain black. While Mom shopped for clothes, we wandered around and three of us ended up in an arcade.

"Here," Dad said, handing her money to buy tokens.

"Why don't you both take pictures there?" he pointed to the photo booth, while he started to play on that automatic basketball machine.

"Why don't we? Don't you want to take pictures with your nee-chan?" she said, pulling my arm to get in the curtained booth. A screen flashed inside, telling us how to pose: happy smile, peace sign, duckface, tongue out. In my irritation, I didn't move in any of those pictures. The result was funny. Well, her face was funny in trying those expressions while mine remained poker. In the end, Mom and Dad joined us inside. The pictures with them aren't that bad. I'm even smiling. She even looks normal. It was a nice day.

* * *

_Sunday_

Mom and Dad left the house after lunch, leaving me alone again with my sister. They left, since they've been out of each other's company and wanted time together. They wanted to take us both with them, but there's classes, contests, and exams. It was a free vacation from where my dad works, and it would be a waste not to use it, so they both went there.

So, beginning today, this week was me and my sister alone here at home  _again_.

It's a Sunday. I did nothing all day but read.

And wouldn't you believe it, I was curious that I ended up: reading  _Flowers in the Attic_ and finished it. I happened to browse the web on my phone and downloaded ebooks from some site, so I read it from my phone. And it was... bad. I'd give it 1 out of 5. I don't like reading stories told in the first person. I was sneering while reading. It was about the siblings Christopher and Catherine, and two lines from the book were striking, what the brother said to the sister:

"I'm never going to love anyone but you, Cathy. I know it... I've got that kind of feeling... just us, always." She told him that if they weren't imprisoned in the attic, they wouldn't feel that way about each other. He answered, "But I _want_ to feel this way about you, and it's too late for me to love or trust anyone else."

And that's me, ending up remembering quotes from a crappy romance novel, with incest at that. It was an odd story told by a naive narrator, the girl, but underneath all that seeming innocence the atmosphere was rampant with lust. I don't quite know how to explain it. I also downloaded translations of popular, foreign book series,  _The Hunger Games_ and  _Series of Unfortunate Events_ , even  _Lord of the Rings._  I don't know if I'll ever get around to reading all of them, though I've started on the first book of  _Hunger Games_  and at least it seems to be better than _Flowers_...

I think Tomoko's spending the whole day on anime marathons again. Didn't see her out of her room today. I stayed in my room, as well.

* * *

_Monday_

This afternoon, it rained. Even if it rains heavy, soccer practice continues. I rather like it that way, where the field is slippery with water and kicking the ball makes water spray, and we're all wet with mud and we all didn't mind at all. It's rather more fun this way, like we're all just playing a game while bathing in the rain. Usually, we'll go to a hot bath all together after the game. We did that today, and I went home late. 6 PM, and my sister wasn't there yet. She arrived later while I was eating dinner, and she was dripping wet from the rain. I told her to take a hot bath if she doesn't want to get sick.

"But I want to get sick, so I have an excuse not to attend classes tomorrow."

"Hell, you can be absent for a day if you really want to without getting yourself a fever. If you want to get sick, your choice."

"You care?"

"I mean, Mom and Dad's not here. I'll be away all day this week for sports practice. If you don't go to school, you'll be by yourself here."

She went up to her room without talking to me. She didn't even go down to eat dinner. When I knocked at her door and told her to, she said she didn't feel like eating. So I washed the dishes, and slept.

* * *

_Tuesday_

She didn't go down for breakfast. So I went up to her room, and she was still sleeping. I placed my hand over her forehead, and she was warmer than usual, which means it's the start of a fever. I watched her sleeping for awhile, as I sat on her bed. I left a note that I'd be home a bit late. I cooked extra food for her lunch.

The day passed by in a blur, and she preoccupied my thoughts. Even in soccer practice, where I'm usually so zen and hitting goals, but now I couldn't concentrate. I wasn't looking, and the ball hit me, when I can usually dodge fast. The coach even asked me if I felt okay. I told him I didn't, so he let me off earlier than the rest of the team. We usually practice well until 8.

When I went home during night, the house was dark. I noticed that the food I left on the dining table this morning was untouched, and that means she didn't eat. So I warmed canned mushroom soup on the stove for her instead, and ate dinner by myself. For a moment, I imagined dropping a spoonful of boiling hot soup on her face for a bit for revenge – she did that too, when she was pretending to care for me when I was sick.

I went to her room first, and the lights were also off. She was a vague shadow covered with blankets, and the bed sheets in disarray and falling to her floor. I was about to turn the light on when she spoke, "Don't. The light hurts my eyes."

So I didn't. I walked nearer to her, placed the tray with the bowl of soup and a glass of water on her bedside table, and stepped closer to her bed. From the little light from the street lamp to the window next to her bed, the shadows under her eyes looked even darker, cheeks more hollow, hair greasier, the pupils dilated that there was no green left. Just all black that looks delirious and uncomprehending. It was not like herself. She tried to get up, but her hands gave in, she ended up lying down again. She was hugging this large purple stuffed toy with a funny face.

"The medicine, nee-chan, did you take some? Here, eat first." I said, my fingers tracing her bangs away from her face, and her skin almost burned. The fever seems to have gotten worse. So I helped her sit up, just enough for her to be able to eat. She clung to me weakly, as if she had no strength left. Once she took the spoon, I thought that she'll be alright by herself. I left for my room, I needed my rest. As I opened the door to leave, there was a clatter from her bed, and I quickly went to her again. She had almost dropped the bowl but she caught it before it could spill, but a little did pour over the table.

I don't want to feed her myself, but with her like this I had no choice. But I didn't like it. She made herself sick. It was  _her_  fault, and I didn't want to bother. It was stupid of her. But if she gets worse,  _I'll_ be the one getting a mouthful from Mom. And so I sat on her bed, and fed her slowly with spoonfuls of soup. She was shaking badly, and I wondered if I'd have to call a doctor or take her to a hospital. When she said she didn't want to eat anymore, I finished what's left of it myself. Then I stood up to leave for real, to wash her dishes and go to sleep.

"Why do you go away? Why don't you stay?" she said, weakly, and it made me sit on her bed again. Usually, she was annoying even if she was sick, but tonight she seemed different. Maybe, this was a sign of a worse disease?

"If I stay here too long I'd be the one infected, and if both of us gets sick no one will watch out for you. Look, I think I'm already starting to get the cold," I said.

"Mom?"

"Mom will be back."

"I will never get well."

"You will."

"The kiss, otouto," she said, voice shaking, weak. It was a whisper, but tonight the house was so quiet I can hear her breath loud. "You said you would."

Then I leaned down. It was a proper, brief kiss. Her mouth smelled and tasted strongly of cherry cough syrup. Then I noticed something I didn't see it at first because it was dark... on her bed was an empty bottle of Robitussin. _Fuck._  This will be a bitch, and I think my night was just ruined.

Then I realized she's a moron. From what I know, cough syrup is an abused over-the-counter drug, and robitussin has  _dextromethorphan_. She finished a whole bottle. An overdose can induce hallucinations and vomiting, and the new bottle was thoroughly consumed. From what I've read, it isn't dangerous if not taken with other drugs. That's all I know, and even then I'm not that sure.

"I can see fireflies and cicadas and bugs. Everything is rippling... Tomoki-kun, I'm afraid."

"Don't be. I'm here."

"You're not real. Tomoki said he'll get out so he won't get infected with my cold. You're just my imagination. That kiss was only in my mind too."

"No."

"I will never get better. I will never be popular. I will never graduate high school because I'll kill myself."

"Don't say that."

"Why do you care? Aren't you the one who told me to kill myself? Do you remember when you promised me one Christmas that we'll take care of each other? Yet you hate me. You laugh at me. You make me get out of your room. You're making your big sister very very sad."

"Nee-chan, you overdosed on cough syrup. That's a very stupid thing to do. You're basically drugged. That's why, you better sleep now."

She didn't say anything after that, and looked like she was already near sleeping. I'm waiting for the right time to get out, then with her eyes closed, she spoke softly,

"Tomoki, do you hate me?" She sounded different when she asked that. I felt now, that she almost sounded like how I imagine normal older sisters should.

"I don't. Yeah, I hate it when you do stupid things. You annoy me, when you act like you own my room and barge in whenever you want to. I really did hate you when we fought about my school application. When I don't talk to you for weeks, that means I hate you. But I can't keep that up for long, when we can't help but see each other every damn day. Now I'm used to you. I  _tolerate_ you, but..."

"I hate you too, but because we're family, you can't just get rid of me," she interrupted. Now her eyes opened, looking straight at me. I felt stupid, like I had said too much.

"Why do you hate me, then?" I asked.

"Because you're a normalfag."

"Now, you sound like you're just jealous of me." But her hand reached to me and she touched my face, gently, though she wasn't really looking at me. Her dilated pupils were out of focus. Then she started saying something that I didn't expect her to.

"When you were born, Tomoki-kun, in the hospital... and mother told me I had a little brother now, did you know how I felt? I didn't know how to speak yet, then. I was one years old. The first time I looked at you, so small and pure, and I felt that I'm never gonna love anything more than you. I loved you so much, I thought I were dying of love, I slept beside you and Mom every day, I never left you..."

Was she  _possessed_  or something? Her hand slowly caressed me all over, my hands, my face, my arms, my stomach. "Look, how you've grown. You used to be so small, now I'm smaller than you..."

Her voice was so low, it was barely a whisper, but in this quiet it was an invading sound. Now this was new. This wasn't my sister speaking. But I suddenly felt very cold, like ice prickling my neck. The feeling you get when you're alone and sense something supernatural. The same feeling when you hear an eerie, haunting song. I felt like I was lying in bed with a ghost that imitated the shape of my sister. Her feverous warmth radiated to me, but I felt colder inside.

"Do you remember that time when we were lost? What you wrote about? Cicadas have no memories? What you wrote was right. After that, you wouldn't play with me anymore. After that, you always mocked me. I tried to get close to you again, but you didn't like me anymore. I think that's why I became like this..."

I almost rolled my eyes. I wanted to think that what she was saying was corny. I wanted to blurt out,  _Who cares?_ She was saying all that in a state of mind I distrust, tainted by mental chemical reactions from too much cough syrup.

"The way you kissed me..."

"What?"

"It's not like on TV."

"Why? What's the kisses on TV? Those aren't real. Those disgusting ones where they look like they're going to swallow each other's mouths? We don't do it that way." This was all silly, like we're talking nonsense, babbling in circles.

"Like this?" and she leaned over to kiss me. She closed her eyes, and pressed her lips softly, chastely against mine. I let her.

But I still said, "Stop kissing me, you're getting your germs into me."

"Stay awake with me. Tell me a story. Like Cicadas have no Memories. Don't you think that you're just a story someone is writing? Maybe I'm actually fiction. That's why god, my writer and creator makes all these stuff happen to me. I'm not happy. It's a series of unfortunate events..."

"Shhhh. Shut up because I'm gonna tell you a story about a brother and a sister..."

"Lost in the wood collecting cicadas?" she asked, but I no longer know, I just made up a story for the sake of having something to speak. I told her a mashed up fairy tale I couldn't remember the exact story of. Orphans, dying of thirst, passed by three rivers but the sister heard the first river sing,  _If you drink from me I'll turn you into a lion_. The second river had the power to turn the drinker into a tiger. They found a third stream was quiet, and overcome with thirst the brother was relieved and drank the water but the sister only heard the water's voice later...  _drink from me I will turn you into a deer_.

So the brother turned into a deer. Hunted by hunters, hunted by wolves, a deer with wide brown eyes and turned with eyes full of sorrow to his sister, trying to speak what it could no longer say. It only made a weak, sad sound of a deer, of a boy trapped in another being. And brother deer and sister wept and went back to home. Something, about the sister marrying a king and the curse eventually broken...

Somehow, I ended up lying on her bed, cradling her in this odd-angled way with my arm holding her to me. Her body curled against mine, her legs crossed over mine, intertwined. I was telling an incoherent story, her answering with more incomprehensible words. She was burning, and I wondered if it was possible for a person to be that sick, that she hasn't ignited and burned herself yet. When you're sick, you feel freezing, but your body feels very hot to others. I never understood that, maybe there's an explanation I still didn't know.

She clung to me, maybe because wanted warmth. And I held on because I don't know. She turned off the air-conditioning since she said it made her cold, and now we're both sweat-damp over her sheets and blankets. She's still drug-dazed, and somehow she was shaking and she crossed her legs over mine and ended up clamping my thigh between her legs. It felt even... warmer there. Then she... held my arm tight enough to bruise and her legs squeezed my thigh tighter. Her sighing became deeper, faster.

And I only belatedly realized that what she was doing was somehow obscene. Pressing against me like that. Moving and breathing against my ear like... what's the word? Aroused? Or just sick? Was it part of the overdose? I would have felt disgusted, but I felt something peculiar myself. She was biting her lip now, thrashing against me, breathing hot against my shirt and soaking to my skin. I pushed my knee between her legs, and she had some sort of reaction, like it hurt. I felt something odd in the pit of my stomach. So this is what it felt like?

I tried to let go. I tried to get her off me, gently, but she held on. And so I let her. Because she asked me to stay, without saying anything. Then she took my hand next. Rested my wrist down under the space between her legs, like she's asking me to touch her there.

"Nee-chan. Go to sleep. You're just taxing yourself," I said.

"I said I can't. I can't." She was holding my hand, the hand between her legs. I only held her hand, not anything else. This near, the more I see how small she is. She's just like a small kid, a boy. She had a thin waist, which can make other girls look shapelier but on her it only made her look starved and malnourished. Her chest is just like a boy's.

"Why're you looking? I feel so cold." She was still holding my hand. "Want to see?" she said, and moved to undress her layers of jackets, and I stopped her.

"I don't. Keep yourself warm."

"Will you go back to your room?"

"Yes. But if you want me to stay I'll sleep on the floor. Just sleep, it'll get better when we wake up. Do you want me to stay?"

"You'll get infected. But stay. Stay. Wait, Tomoki, before you sleep..."

"What?"

"Kiss me goodnight."

I kissed her on the cheek. I'm already feeling a bit of migraine. I know that soon I'll get sick too, we've shared the virus many times tonight, from her mouth to mine. She was drugged. Curling myself to sleep, I thought of what we just did. And what I find stranger isn't the act itself, but that I didn't find anything wrong with it. I even encouraged it.

Shit. Maybe it's all because the lack of sleep is distorting my mind. Was the drug high infectious?

My last thought before sleep was the teacher's voice in that writing class in school.  _Write down your first, real thoughts. Not the thoughts you'd like yourself to think._  The way I think about it, I've been covering up my real thoughts and feelings, thinking that I should be feeling something else instead.

* * *

_Wednesday_

Last night was a blur. I woke up in  _her_  bed. I didn't manage to even get a mattress so I can sleep on her floor, then. But when I opened my eyes I was alone. Migraine pounded the insides of my head. The clock in her room said it was 11 in the morning. I jolted upright. No chance of going to school, then. I fixed her mess of a bed, and dragged myself out. I went down, and when I was about to mix a cup of coffee in the kitchen, I heard vomiting sounds from the bathroom. I opened the door to the bathroom, and there was Tomoko, bent over the toilet and retching.

She looked back at me, and she's paler, her lips white and skin looking sucked out of blood. "Help me over here, will you? I'm dying," she said, voice hoarse. I knelt next to her and only helped her by keeping her hair out of the toilet bowl, holding her head by the hair. This near, it smelled bad. But I got the sense that if I wasn't supporting her, she would've already had her face down the toilet. It took too long, her vomiting.

"You can let go now," she said. "That hurt. And I need a shower, shit, I smell so bad." She was clutching her stomach, sitting on the tile floor in a pained posture. I flushed the toilet and closed it, then stood up and sat on it.

"You were freaking out last night. You swallowed down a whole bottle of cough syrup... was that intentional?" I asked, looking down at her on the floor.

"Was I? I can't recall anything, all I have now is this damn  _headache_. Yesterday, my cough just wouldn't stop, I do remember I drank it all because my throat hurt."

"You  _idiot_."

"I woke up with you beside me. Was it really that bad last night?"

"You were saying stupid things."

"Like what?"

I sighed. "You were like, declaring your unrequited love for me," I said with a sneer.

And then she looked like she was gonna puke again. "Then forget it."

She opened the sliding door leading to the bath, and turned on the faucet. Steam from the hot water filled the room, creating a film of moisture over the sink mirror, reducing my reflection to a blur. She sat in the tub with all her clothes on. She breathed deeply. She was sneezing a lot, and there I was, sitting on the closed toilet. I felt like I had to watch out for her, I don't trust that she'll get by herself. The water filled to the brim, and her sneezing still won't stop. So I had to get in and turn it off. Then she pulled me to the water, splashing water all over. This is annoying. I grit my teeth and glared at her in irritation, my clothes were soaked. She was smiling in a tired way.

But I stayed with her in the bathtub instead. We're on opposite sides of the tub, her facing me. We're taking a bath together. Just like the old days. She took this yellow rubber duck and floated it between us. Also, this was the tiny floating duck that was our old companion during our baths as children. The plastic is fading, now...

"Are you still going to school this afternoon?" she asked, but she was looking at the water and not at me.

"Most likely not. You've infected me. I feel sick." I stretched myself out, letting my body soak, and I closed my eyes. As much as possible, I don't want to be absent. But the beginning of sickness was all over me. I didn't say anything, just sort of meditated there in the water. Sometime there she went out and used the nearby shower, while I dozed. After I heard her walk out the door, I took a proper shower myself.

She's alone on the dining table. She's changed yesterday's clothes to that old ratty cotton dress, plain white but yellowing from age. I sat in front of her, and ate. We had nothing to eat now but sandwiches for brunch, and we had run out of coffee.

"I need coffee. And since we have no sugar and eggs... I'll go to the supermarket," I said, after eating.

"I'll go with you."

"You sure? You were puking your guts out."

So we went outside, and we used the bike, me maneuvering while she's sitting near the back wheel. I think we look completely ridiculous and sick, like pale zombies. But the village streets were empty, with people out working or students in school. On the way, she was coughing and sneezing, using this long towel as a scarf and using it to wipe her snot. We stopped at the nearby supermarket, wandered around the grocery, me getting the needed things while she goes to gather chocolate, candies, and ice cream. We bought a large box of pizza for take-out. Instead of going straight home after buying stuff, we ended up taking a detour around town.

###

These streets and houses are new. It's been long since I had a proper look around the village. We passed by unfamiliar quiet streets, new houses that I didn't notice before. Then, we passed by several homes still being constructed, then by a wide block with only tall weeds and grass. I might have known this place exists just near our home, but I didn't have time to really go around here.

There was a house, unfinished but abandoned. I parked the bike in front of it, and we stopped to wander around the place. The concrete one-story house had no roof, and inside the walls were overgrown plants. An abandoned house seems like an alien thing in an industrial city, a glitch in the landscape of tall corporate buildings, factories, malls, villages with crowding houses. We went inside this house, surveyed the unused rooms. It is calm here, and the vines and weeds had made up a disordered garden. People may have not lived here, but other living things took up residence. But sooner or later, the land will be changed, this house will be taken down to build something new.

I went around and saw: two rooms that would have been bedrooms, a bathroom with halfway-tiled walls, a kitchen counter. Tomoko was bent over the dust-filled sink, and there she was, watching a cicada in the act of taking off its old skin. A single straight line cracked open the amber shell, where a new insect crept out and flew away.

We sat on the unfinished window ledge, the box of pepperoni pizza between us, and we gorged ourselves on pizza, Coke, candy. Neither of us felt like leaving. When was the last time we had time for ourselves, with nothing getting in the way? We've talked, before, but I much prefer her shutting up. Like this. Maybe tomorrow when she gets better she'll be annoying again.

"I'm wasting my second year in high school. My situation never changed from first year." She was the first to break the silence.

"Well. I thought you've improved so much after deciding talking to me every night about your problems wasn't worth it."

"Will I ever get a boyfriend? Be popular? New year's coming, yet my life still sucks. In the fewest possible words, what do you think is the ultimate solution?" She asked this like she was some sort of dumb game show host.

"You have to go into the world, meet people, and get hurt."

"I'm afraid of getting hurt."

"If you want happiness, you have to risk rejection and hurt. I know I'm younger than you, but that's how the world works."

"Then it will be easier for you than for me. You're doing a better job at this high school popularity thing. I hate you because of that."

"Yeah, I know."

"But family's your destiny. Cliché as it may sound, everything may go away but not your family. Family's there, to protect you, to be loyal to you, to love you. So why not  _us_? Me and you?"

"You're practically inviting me to commit incest? No thanks." This conversation was going downhill.

"Don't flatter yourself. What I mean is. Family's supposed to be there for you, right?" She had a way of making everything we talk about into nonsense.

"You used to be more optimistic. There's still college, you know, and at sixteen, you barely know anything about life yet. Maybe it's not yet your time."

"But if I had no other choice, will you be there for me?"

"I was there before the choices. I will be there when there are no choices. As if you had  _other_  choices, huh, nee-chan? Are you that much of a loser that you can't attract anyone else that you'd turn to your little brother?" I said, mocking her.

"You're one to talk. Didn't you propose to  _marry_  me when you were four, huh, otouto?" And she smiled that annoying, self-satisfied smirk.

That did it. The Coke I was drinking almost came out of my nose. She still remembered that? I felt sick.

"We better go home, before I get worse, or you would have to use the bike and carry me yourself," I said instead, ending the ridiculous conversation. So we finished the last of the pizza and headed home. Nothing much happened after that, we ate cup noodles for dinner and without asking for my permission, she slept in my room, on the floor. None of the strange events of last night transpired again.

* * *

_Thursday_

It was my turn to get sick, and her turn to take care of me. I woke to darkness, and the heavy sound of rain against the roof above me. I woke 11 AM, near noon, but the gloom can be mistaken for night. My sister was there, sitting on the floor, and the only light and color in this grey scale morning was from the glow of her Game Boy screen. She was concentrating on playing.

The heavy rain meant another absent in school for me, and for her.

There was food on my table. I never knew she could cook a proper meal, but there it was. The meat on the steak could use a little salt and the rice was soggy, but it was okay. She even brought me warm coffee. This kind of weather makes me want to stay in bed and sleep the whole day. Since I'm sick, I could do just that for the whole day.

After eating, I turned on my room's TV. News about Christmas. I forgot about that, because it wasn't an occasion we were usually celebrating. The news show was showing this feature of how it was celebrated in other countries. On the screen were images of snow, Christmas trees, Santa Claus, reindeers, and mistletoe wreaths. I watched while lying in bed.

Thunder rumbled above. Lightning flashed. Then the TV turned itself off. A black out? That's fine. I had no other plans for today but to sleep anyway.

I noticed that on the table, the paper where I wrote _Cicadas have no Memories_  is neatly taped together where it was torn before. Somehow, it felt good to be absent once in a while.

* * *

_Friday_

Friday. Another holiday, another day with no class. We had been absent for two days in a row. Which means we're also free until Sunday.

On the living room sofa, was a box. Written on it, in my handwriting, was "Pieces of Summer. Tomoki and Tomoko." I opened it, and inside were cicada skins already years old. Seeing this made me remember. This was the evidence of the very  _last_ time we collected them together, just before the incident of getting lost together. I recall that I insisted to write our names down, I had wanted to impress her that I knew how to write.

"Where did you find this?" I asked her, as she sat beside me, about to turn on the TV. Some drama was showing.

"In the basement. Along with your old notebook."

The basement. A destination of things forgotten, a place only revisited to throw old things out, objects that contain memories of a time long gone that will never go back.

"New year's coming up. I bought fireworks. Will you burn them with me?"

I nodded.

"What we talked about the other day... about what you said, 'I was there before the choices. I will be there when there are no choices. As if you had  _other_  choices'. Is that true? Did that mean you agreed to what I..."

"Yes."

"Are you sure?"

"Don't worry about it."

She bent down, and kissed me on the forehead, ruffled my hair. An odd gesture, done out of the blue. I felt so little again. As her hand found mine as naturally as two puzzle pieces fit, I thought of cicadas. It will still be long, I think, before the skin of old prejudices and petty grudges shed themselves completely and show us as we truly are – just a brother and a sister, born to love and protect each other. Just as cicadas emerge anew, just as a year ends to begin another... We still had a chance to go back to the way we were before, the way we truly are, the way we must be for always.

Those are first, real thoughts. Not what I would like myself to think.

I never said it, but tried to make her feel it in the way I never let go for that moment.  _You will no longer feel alone as long as I'm with you._

_End_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This whole story was started coz I just wanted to try writing first-person for a change. So this was only an experiment. Another fic on this pairing is coming up... next year! Thanks to those who left encouraging comments for the last segments! But I have doubts about this chapter. What do you think? :/


End file.
